Abnormal Functional Connectivity and Structure-Function Coupling of the Nucleus Accumbens in Major Depressive Disorder Supplementary materials

Use analysis of variance (ANOVA) to compare the inter group differences of bilateral NAc and sSC in 245 other brain regions. Age, gender, and years of education are included as covariates in the model. Use MATLAB software for False Discovery Rate (FDR) correction, with a significance level set to P<0.05 after FDR correction. The results showed that compared with the healthy control HCs, the MDD group exhibited significantly enhanced connectivity patterns in 29 brain regions (Table S1): (1) Brain regions with enhanced connectivity to the left nucleus accumbens (L.NAc) structure: bilateral Middle Temporal Gyrus (MTG), bilateral hippocampus, left dorsal caudate nucleus, left superior occipital gyrus, right globus pallidus, right superior temporal Gyrus (STG), right parietal lobule, right inferior parietal lobule, right insula, and right posterior parietal thalamus (PPtha). (2) The brain regions with enhanced connections to the right nucleus accumbens (R.NAc) include the left STG, left MTG, left inferior temporal gyrus (ITG), left hippocampus, and right ventral occipital lobe (lingual gyrus tail, cLinG). The above results indicate that compared with the normal control group, patients with depression have significant abnormalities in the strength of white matter fiber connections centered around NAc. These abnormalities mainly involve the cortical marginal nerve loop, cortical basal ganglia nerve loop, and temporal occipital lobe cortical region. This result provides imaging evidence for the involvement of NAc structural connectivity abnormalities in the neuropathological mechanism of depression. For a detailed discussion on the results of inter group comparison in SC, please refer to the published paper: Zhao X, Fan Z, Yin Q, Yang J, Wu G, Tang S, Ouyang X, Liu Z, Chen X, Tao H. Aberrant white matter structural connectivity of nucleus accumbens in patients with major depressive disorder: A probabilistic fibre tracing study. J Affect Disord. 2025 Jul 15; 381:158-165. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2025.03.182. Epub 2025 Apr 2. PMID: 40185407.